Great question. I'm afraid there’s no short answer - especially as, during my time in sport, funding changed totally. I’ll take you through my history and when it comes to explaining the UKSport, Lottery Funding and EIS I’ll try to keep it as clear and simple as I can.

When I was 18 I won the Junior World Championships and received £700 from the Sports Aid Foundation. I used that to buy a pair or oars for my single scull. At that time there was no Lottery Funding, but you could earn a Sports Aid Grant based on your world ranking at the end of the season. The drawback with that was that you didn’t receive a grant (even if you were in the national team) until the end of the season.

In those days, you had to have a job and train, which resulted in less than optimum results. If you won a medal your grant was in the region of £4,000 a year - but out of that money, you had to pay to attend selection weekends, training camps, and even the World Championships.

The problem with working and training was that you didn't have enough time to rest and recover – a crucial part of training. As a result, you'd get ill often, which would lead you to miss training. We were caught in a vicious circle.

I contracted tonsillitis on the day of the Opening Ceremony at the Atlanta 1996 Olympics and was withdrawn. I was convinced I became ill because my immune system was battered after having worked flat out to help me manage the training load and a job at the same time. You can imagine my devestation.

Four years later in Sydney, I decided I wasn’t going to let the same thing happen even if it meant building up massive debts.

‘Luckily’ for me, Great Britain did so badly at the ’96 Games (only Steve Redgrave and Matt Pinsent won gold) that Lottery Funding through UK Sport was introduced and athletes started earning funding based on their world ranking.This time around, rather than it all coming down to an end of season decision, you were monitored by an International Performance Director, who would make a funding recommendation for you to UKSport. They effectively decided whether you warranted funding promotion or relegation, which happened far quicker than previously.

The governing bodies also received a grant (based on their predicted and achieved medal count at an Olympics). This money was used to pay coaches, fund the administrative side of the governing body, plus pay for equipment and training camps. £1,000 per annum was available for athletes to do an educational course alongside training and “Lifestyle Managers” were employed by the EIS to (try) and ensure athletes didn’t just play Playstation when they weren’t training but progressed outside of sport as well.

The EIS also provides first class physiological and psychological services once an athlete is on their sport's talent ID list or involved in the national selection process. It’s not a coincidence that we went from one Olympic gold medal in 1996 to 11 in 2000.

The funding works differently in every sport so as the first step is always to contact your sport's governing body and confirm the pathway to funding.

Do I pass Emma? Wish your students good luck.

Have a question for James? Email askcracknell@telegraph.co.uk and we'll put it to him next week